I have been feeling for some time that my life is WAY too computer driven. Not only computer, but cell phone, iPad and just technology in general. I'm not trying to sound so "old school" (or show my age) but I'm not happy about it.
I like holding a REAL book in my hands, I like putting an actual CD in the car or BOOM BOX, and I like having a conversation with my kids without their cell phones in their hands!
Where is this world headed? I understand the NEED to have technology and it's not going away. I'm blogging right now, so I get that there are benefits to it. But what about the things I'm missing...
- Real conversations, not FB posts or Twitter posts in less that 140 characters...
- Sitting outside on the patio furniture with a good hard cover book
- Reading the Newspaper with your morning Joe at the kitchen table
- Spending time with the kids OUTSIDE
- School vacations spent doing crafts
- Taking walks without our iTunes in our ears
- the list can go on and on...
I'm not saying this to make anyone feel bad. I JUST FEEL something... and I've felt this way for a while and I don't mean to preach it to anyone. I just know that I need to make a change and I've been coming up with ways to do that. So here's what I am going to try and do:
1. Set HOURS for my work schedule. This may sound silly, but when you work from home, work and "home" get meshed together and I'm never NOT available. So from now on, I work from 9-5 just like most jobs and I'm going to try and keep it that way. So if you email me in the evening, just know I'll get back to you the next morning.
2. Stop checking FB and other social media all. the. time. I don't think I'm the only one doing this, but it's ridiculous how much I've been glued to it all. Do I really NEED to know everything, at all times that is going on?? I'm "unplugging" a bit and here's a few ways I'm doing that:
- I'm changing my NOTIFICATIONS on my iphone so I dont' get notified every time someone likes my Instagram, or sends me a message on FB or Twitter.
- I'm changing my FB page to just family and close friends. How can I communicate with over 500 friends? How can I see what's going on with my close friends and family when my FB feed goes on and on. So I'm sorry, but yesterday I went down to 200 "friends" on FB. *more on that later*
- I'm going to force myself to change my ways. I need to be mindful of my time on FB and other social media and try to limit it to short periods of time and NONE during family time. (Yes, I too have my iphone on my lap while watching TV as a family at night)
3. Get more organized! This is a big one for me. I'm SO bad at lists. I've talked about it before and I still have a hrad time with this. I'm very forgetful and lists would help me SO much! But I forget to write lists. :) So my goal is to USE the "life journal" I just made and every morning spend a bit of time writing a LIST of to-do's. Here's my journal I made last week:

When I made it last week I really thought about what I wanted it for. I thought the title "Hello Life" was appropriate because I want to be AWARE of my life. I don't want it slipping away, day by day, without FEELING it or LIVING it. Yes, I'm getting OFF my computer driven life and I'm saying Hello to LIFE.
4. Talk more. Have lunch with friends more. Ask questions more. Be a part of this community more. Ok, this is a hard one to admit. We've lived here for almost 10 years and I haven't really ever plugged in. I have friends here, but not a lot. We haven't really plugged in at church. I hate to admit it, but I don't go to bible study at our church. I don't take walks with moms from school, I don't meet them for lunch. I take my kids to school, drive back home, go do my errands, work from home and then pick them up from school and go home. I'm not active in this community at all. That's got to change. I have more FB/blog friends that I talk to then people in my own town.
Well, that's just a few things I've been thinking of this week. I hope this isn't too deep for you. I'm not trying to get anyone else to change, I just want to change some things in my life.
The big thing is...I don't want to look back years from now on my time at home and see that I spent the MAJORITY of my time on my computer!
So what do you think? You have any tips for "unplugging" or simple rules you hold yourself to? I would LOVE to hear from YOU! Any ideas on getting more organized with my time. Please feel free to share your ideas here, I would love to hear them!
Have a GREAT Tuesday!
Hugs,
Laura
*And about my FB page and downsizing:
I went from over 500 friends to 200 friends yesterday on my personal FB PAGE. I can imagine that maybe this quick decision could have caused some confusion. I explained it 2 times on my page, but I want to explain it here too. I wanted to get my PERSONAL FB PAGE down to just family and close friends. I have over 175 FAMILY members people...(my mom is the youngest of 9 siblings and they all had lots of kids too :) so it was just too hard to see what my family was doing on FB when my wall had soooo many people! So I asked everyone I was friends with in the "Creative World" to go LIKE my Creative Retreats FB PAGE. I decided that that's where I would be posting about my creative endeavors so I can stop flooding my family with pictures of scrappy stuff they don't really care about. That way I can keep things seperate. So PLEASE, add my FB PAGE: A Kiss on the Chic's Creative Retreats on FB if you want to follow along with me in the Artsy world! And I certaily apologize if you got "unfriended" on FB and didn't understand why. It says that you can still see my wall, so I think you can still follow along on both. But I felt I needed to downsize so I could focus on my family and spend less time on FB overall.
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Oh, I forgot to share!!
I blogged for the 1st time on Maya Road's DT BLOG yesterday! I shared my Wreath Inspiration over there, so go check it out! Here's a SNEAK of my Wreath:

You can see the full article and more pictures on the Maya Road DT blog. I was SO nervous about my 1st post over there. If you've followed me on here, you know I'm not the best at spelling and I use WAY too many !!! So go check it out and let me know how I did. :)
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